‘Extend workforce programs here to end reliance on guest workers’

Extending to the CNMI some of the successful federal workforce development programs would slowly reduce the Commonwealth’s reliance on foreign workers, according to the 902 report that was transmitted to U.S. Congress last week.

This is one of the recommendations agreed on by both the federal and CNMI government panels in the 902 report to help sustain the Commonwealth’s renewed economic growth.

The CNMI-Only Transitional Worker Nonimmigrant Visa or CW1 program allows foreign laborers to legally stay and work in the Commonwealth. Employers renew their workers’ CW1 visas yearly, with a numerical cap that will be reduced at every start of each fiscal year. The program ends on Dec. 31, 2019, but CNMI officials are requesting for another extension.

Both panels are now asking the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Office of Insular Affairs to work with the U.S. Department of Labor to include the CNMI in its successful federal programs that encourages workforce development.

Getting these programs here to the CNMI would increase the Commonwealth’s ability and potential to train and hire U.S. qualified workers in preparation for the end of the CW1 program.

Workforce development programs like Wagner-Peyser—from the Wagner-Peyser Act of 1933 signed by then President Franklin D. Roosevelt—Job Corps, and Trade Adjustment Assistance increase the CNMI’s ability in training and hiring U.S. qualified employees in preparation for the end of the CW1 transition period.

Wagner-Peyser created the U.S. Employment Service that coordinates public employment services so it could provide labor exchange and job finding assistance to individuals who are looking for work and employers that are hiring.

Esther Kia’aina, the former Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Insular Affairs and the U.S. representative to the 902 talks, discussed the possibility of extending these workforce development programs to the CNMI with U.S. Labor Assistant Secretary for Congressional and Inter-government Affairs Adri Jayaratne in September last year.

Guam, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands are eligible for these programs, along with several U.S. states and the District of Columbia. Extending these to the CNMI and American Samoa “would ensure all the territories are treated equally.”

This, however, requires an act of Congress, along with extending the Trade Adjustment Assistance eligibility and establishing a Job Corps training center in the CNMI. The Job Corps program would also need Congress to appropriate funding in building a new center.

“Although federal money from another department could potentially be used to build a Job Corps Center, [CNMI residents] are eligible to train at other [JCC] locations such as Hawaii. Finding ways to facilitate sending CNMI youths to other [JCC] locations may be a more cost-effective and timesaving process,” the 902 report states.

Both Kia’aina and Gov. Ralph DLG Torres—the CNMI representative on the 902 panel—also support congressional action so the CNMI would be eligible for the earned income tax credit and TAA. “The EITC in particular will incentivize recipients of social services to enter the labor force and help reduce the CNMI’s reliance on CW workers,” the report added.